Right practice is steady practice. Whether you feel lazy or diligent, just keep practicing.

Anxiety and excitement are the same emotion. The only difference is our attitude toward the experience.

The nature of life is change. The nature of change is painful. The nature of pain is temporary.

The path to liberation requires both individual effort and the support of the spiritual community.

The practice of Zen is forgetting the self in the act of uniting with something.

The path to liberation is through understanding the true nature of mind and matter through direct observation.

The more we understand impermanence, the more we appreciate each moment of our lives.

The planet does not need more successful people. The planet desperately needs more peacemakers, healers, restorers, storytellers, and lovers of all kinds.

This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.

The past is for learning from, not for living in.

The development of wisdom does not occur in isolation but requires the cultivation of the entire Noble Eightfold Path.

When you plant lettuce, if it does not grow well, you don't blame the lettuce. You look for reasons it is not doing well. It may need fertilizer, or more water, or less sun. You never blame the lettuce.

The mind is like a well-forged sword - it adapts to all situations.

The ultimate source of happiness is not money and power, but warm-heartedness.

The measure of success in spiritual life is how peaceful you are.

The root of suffering is not in the world outside us but in our own minds.

The Four Noble Truths are not mere doctrinal propositions but a framework for understanding and transforming our lives.

The person who clings to nothing of the past, present and future, who has no attachment and no aversion, has no conceptual imprints.

Through our eyes, the universe is perceiving itself. Through our ears, the universe is listening to its harmonies. We are the witnesses through which the universe becomes conscious of its glory, of its magnificence.

Zen teaches nothing; it merely enables us to wake up and become aware. It does not teach, it points.

This very body is the Buddha. And this very earth the lotus paradise.

When another person makes you suffer, it is because he suffers deeply within himself, and his suffering is spilling over. He does not need punishment; he needs help.

When you note pain, you should not dwell on the thought, "I feel pain." Simply recognize the presence of pain.

The greatest obstacle to meditation is our expectation about what it should be.

Let none find fault with others; let none see the omissions and commissions of others. But let one see one's own acts, done and undone.

Life is available only in the present moment.

Let go of what has passed. Let go of what may come. Let go of what is happening now. Don't try to figure anything out. Don't try to make anything happen. Relax, right now, and rest.

The mind is intrinsically empty. It's empty of all that we perceive as being intrinsically "me" and "mine."

Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.

In a mind clear as still water, even the waves, breaking, are reflecting its light.

Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know.

We don't set out to save the world; we set out to wonder how other people are doing and to reflect on how our actions affect other people's hearts.

The moment you note a thought, it disappears. The noting mind keeps the hindrances away.